A column by CHUCK POLLOCK, Wellsville Sun and Olean Star Senior Sports Columnist
Two seats down from my spot on St. Bonaventure basketball’s press row, was an empty seat.
In front of it was a score sheet and a crowd-noise microphone on a stand with a headset wrapped around it.
It was a silent tribute to long-time Bonnie broadcast analyst Don Scholla who had died of a massive heart attack Tuesday morning at Olean General Hospital at age 68.
The irony is, that night he was to work the Bona game against Dayton, one of its biggest rivals, in what turned out to be a 22-point blowout and a win Scholla would have relished commenting on.
Over the three decades I knew him, two words described Don Scholla for me, “gentle man.” Oh, he was also surely the one-word version, but when talking to his friends, teaching colleagues and students they emphasized his qualities as a person and his calm, friendly, empathetic understanding way of dealing with people. He had found the perfect amalgamation of three careers, teaching, coaching and broadcasting.
In his 35 years as a teacher, starting at Rushford, the Angelica native won over 400 games coaching basketball and soccer of both genders and baseball. He moved on to Olean High in 1988 before retiring in 2013, the last 20 of those years spent as the school’s athletic while also coaching girls basketball and winning 14 league titles, five Section 6 Class B championships and a Far West Regional.
IN A SECTION 6 biography when he took the job as its treasurer, a post he held for seven years, Scholla said, “I loved sports more than anything in the world and teaching physical education seemed like a logical way of staying involved. It was a great decision, as I have had a truly rewarding career as a teacher, coach and athletic administrator.”
He credited the influence of his high school basketball coach, Bruce Voorhis, who served as a mentor, and added, “I have been touched and have learned from the many people I have met over my years in education. They have all influenced me in some ways, and I have stolen many good ideas from several them.
“I have also been blessed to be married to Janine, the best and most dedicated history teacher I have ever known (OHS, ’88-‘13). She too has been an important role model, sharing her knowledge, offering encouragement and support.”
SCHOLLA, got an Associates Degree from Genesee Community College, a Bachelors from Cortland, a Masters from Alfred and his School Administrator’s Certificate from St. Bonaventure. And, after retiring served as an associate women’s basketball coach at Houghton plus a stint with the Pitt-Bradford program.
He completed his third marathon in 2016, at age 60.
But the most interesting entry on his resume was this: Scholla was a member of the United States Trotters Association, a licensed trainer/driver/groom in harness racing.
Eventually, though, his most recent identity was as analyst for play-by-play man Gary Nease on the St. Bonaventure On-Line Basketball Network.
“I kind of jokingly asked him, 13 years ago,” Nease recalled, “‘Do you know of anybody who wants to do color for Bonaventure games?’ If you’ve got anybody in mind let me know.” And he says, ‘Yeah, me.’”
“The job was basically home games but Don decided to add anything he could (drive) to, he was such a basketball junkie and he did it on his own dime. When we hired John Watson (who died after the 2011-12 season) we had a luncheon and he said, ‘I’m not taking a dime for this.’ “When that happened Bonaventure and the radio station said, ‘We’re not going to pay anything (for a color announcer).’:
Nease continued, “He was such a basketball nut he probably watched every game that was on TV over a weekend. His coaching, the strategy involved, he just had a good mind for it. When he would talk to Mark (Schmidt, Bona coach) after a game, the questions were always pertinent and nothing silly … it was straight strategy, ‘What did you think about this?’”
Scholla started when the games were on WPIG and, for distant road games, his commentary came from watching TV at the station and when Bona took over the broadcasts, he watched a television in the Reilly Center.
“But that was difficult to do,” Nease said, “because there’s such a delay between radio and TV so I couldn’t include him much during the game. But I could get him on for pregame, halftime and postgame, anything I could do to get him on so that I wasn’t doing a two-hour monologue.
“He was at almost every practice that Bonaventure had. In fact, a couple of coaches remember seeing him in the stands Monday night, watching as they prepared for Dayton, so (his passing) was a shock to them too.”
OF HIS relationship with Scholla, Nease said, “Looking at social media, the one word that kept coming up was ‘nice’ and I use that word too. The other word I would use is ‘dedicated’ to whatever he put his mind to. He was dedicated to his family and teachers and administrators said he was very dedicated to what he did.
“It was so unusual on Tuesday night, it had been awhile since I had done a game by myself … back when we didn’t have a color man (traveling) and it was just me. It just felt weird, Chris (Russell, producer) would break in every once and awhile and he did halftime, postgame and pregame but nothing in the game. It was strange to do that. I got a little tingly late in the game when I realized I was doing Don’s job too,” Nease added.
Oddly, Nease (Cuba) and Scholla (Angelica), though separated by two years, think they played high school baseball against each other.
Nease recalling his broadcast partner, noted, “He was easy to talk to and I keep coming back to ‘kind (nice)’ … he always had a smile on his face, if something was bothering him he didn’t let it effect him. He was so dedicated to his job he hated when he had to miss a game for whatever reason. He wanted to be there to help and at the end of the game he’d help us pack up the equipment … he just wanted to be a part of what we did, that was important to him.
“Probably, eight, nine times Tuesday night, I turned to my right (Scholla’s seat) to ask a question and I caught myself and realized ‘I’ve got to do it myself now.’”
(Chuck Pollock, a Wellsville Sun and Olean Star senior sports columnist, can be reached at cpollock@wnynet.net.)
